Gustave Doré - Triumph of Christianity (c. 1868) - Art Gallery of Hamilton, Canada
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Painted by the French artist Paul Gustave Louis Christophe Doré (1832-1883).
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"Doré was eccentric, obsessive, multi-talented, prolific - he created some 10,000 illustrations in his short life - and aesthetically daring. A child prodigy, he drew caricatures at the age of five, and by fifteen had landed a three-year contract with the Parisian weekly Journal pour rire. This four-page newspaper consisted mainly of comical drawings, and had a mission to keep its readers “in a state of permanent joviality, extremely good for the health,” according to an ad at the time. With Doré on board, circulation soared.
In his early twenties, Doré began painting huge social-realist paintings. He became a professional book illustrator, taking on the canon of European literature with works by Dante, Rabelais, La Fontaine, Cervantes, Milton, Shakespeare, Tennyson and Hugo. His illustrated edition of the Bible was hugely successful. By the 1860s, Doré was at the centre of Parisian life. He met Napoleon III, Alexandre Dumas. Liszt, Rossini and Wagner, had a relationship with Sarah Bernhardt, and threw lively parties. He took up sculpture in 1877, just six years before his death of a heart attack at age 51." (gallery.ca)
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